HTML is so 200x. In my wild mind, I see what Adobe AIR and Google’s Chrome-OS are bringing to the table as a prediction of things to come. While the two might seem vastly different, they shine light on what I believe will be the future of our “on-line” experience.

Adobe AIR, is a recent tool by Adobe which introduces cross platform development giving developers a universal market. While not all of the applications available are portals to web applications, the majority of them interface with on-line counterparts. When people think AIR, they are usually thinking about their favorite Twitter desktop client, however the potential goes far beyond just that as the platform will grow to provide what I think will be a corner stone to the future of development. Taking it a step further, Google developed their Chrome OS as a portal to their services for people on the go, specifically net book owners.

Chrome-OS, while an actual operating system, provides the same on line ideology of AIR (if not more). Chrome OS is a hybrid of hardware based technologies and cloud reliance. With Chrome-OS the idea is that the user will have a lightweight, almost instantly accessible operating system which connects applications (provided by Google and third party developers). Relying on Java, rather then operating on web based programming languages like PHP and Javascript. These applications, the life of your user experience, will require almost no overhead and will be ready to go within seconds of powering on your machine.

To me both of these products are huge. Thanks to AIR, I’ve been able to utilize a lot of the same applications I use on my desktop on my new Netbook running Ubuntu Netbook Remix. Meaning, that with almost no effort, I am able to maintain the same level of productivity without having to adjust to new interfaces. Looking forward to Chrome-OS, the ability to interface with my Google Accounts is a huge step forward because I already use Google’s on line solutions for email, documents, contact management and even Google Voice as my primary number.

On the back burner, a bit less hyped, is Microsoft’s new solution which is looking to provide a cloud based solution for application hosting. While I’ve broken free of Microsoft’s grips, in terms of M$ Office, I still am considering this a step in the right direction for those backing ASP languages. I’m still a bit new to the pricing structure, which seems on par with other cloud solutions, however backing from such an industry leader is a good sign. Conveniently they saw it fit to make the announcement the same day Google announced Chrome-OS.

While I’ve become a big supporter of cloud based solutions in recent months, I have to say that beyond the convenience of being “portable,” cloud solutions still worry a lot of people. The first question I hear is always, without fail, “security” followed with the question of reliability. My response to both of these is “I’m sure the tech who set up the servers hosting your information know more about the issue than you or I.” In the cases of Chrome-OS and Adobe AIR, you’re trusting little extra with the corporations then you are currently using their products and services. Ideally, you’d be sharing less because you are interacting directly with the server and not a document based interface.

It’s funny how easily one’s opinion can be changed overnight, amazingly it’s happened to me 3 times this week.  Initially, I figured that Wave was going to be wrecked by spam (even in its first few days) and “add me” posts as Twitter and even the Android market is.  This was short lived after I received my preview invite, when I started reading the Waves posted and seeing how people were actually using the new technology.  Even at this point, I saw Wave as a collaboration tool with networking features, however after hours of more use I realized that it’s even more than just collaboration and its potential as a networking tool is great.

The basics:

A Wave is an article (Single author or collaboration) which is editable in real time by it’s authors.  The comments are also in “real time,” and access is determined by the original author.

Wave was just released to 100k users for public beta testing, which means there will probably be issues with it initially.

Google has said that Wave will work with Android, however to my knowledge there hasn’t been any specifics yet.

Browser Choice:

It seems a lot of people are having issues with different browsers, this is expected because it’s a “preview.” However, it seems that it’s a bit tasking on any browser at this point creating lag.  As of now, I’m using Google Chrome for my primary browser, and it seems to be running in line with FireFox 3.5.  There are a couple noticeable differences, primarily in how a LARGE wave loads.  With Firefox the Wave seems to take longer to load, however makes the wave readable quicker.  In Chrome, the overall process is a lot quicker, although the articles are obscured longer then Mozilla.   I could imagine with Mozilla’s habit of hogging ram, that Chrome would be better for chronic Wave users.

Mobile:

I’m an Android lover, we all know this, however I’m surprised that the mobile site for Wave hasn’t been completely developed yet.  When pulling up the page on my G1 (running Cyanogen’s latest Rom), the site will load with the warning above and allow me to access a page displaying my inbox and contacts button at the top, however will only show completed Waves an takes EXTREMELY long to load.  I wouldn’t even attempt to load it on a mobile connection, seeing as it’s taking a long time on WiFi.

The site, in the browser, has an iphone feel to it, which makes me think that there’s an Application in development from Google for the Android, meaning that there will likely be increased features in comparison to the mobile browser.  I have tried, without success, to create a Wave from my phone’s browser.  This is not to say that it’s impossible, but extremely inefficient.

*** More Android Screenshots coming soon!***

Larger Wave’s should probably be left for browsing on the computer, seeing as my only successful attempts at loading Wave’s have been with one’s that had little activity.

The other issue I noticed was it only works in landscape mode, whereas in portrait the only thing which loads is a header of the wave.